Fbi Informer Testifies In Trial Of El Rukns

October 20, 1987|By Liz Sly.

A drug dealer with long-standing links to the South Side El Rukns street gang described Monday how he helped FBI agents set up the sale of an inert missile to senior gang members in return for $10,000.

Sam Buford, whose relationship with the El Rukns began in 1968 when he dated the sister of a former gang leader, agreed to cooperate with police after they arrested him on drug charges.

Assistant U.S. Atty. John Podliska said last week that Buford also had received $10,000 from federal authorities for his assistance.

Buford said he was introduced to FBI agent Willie Hulon, who last week testified that he had sold accused gang member Alan Knox an M-72 light anti-tank weapon after claiming he had a friend working at an Army base who could steal equipment.

Knox is accused, along with El Rukns leader Jeff Fort, Leon McAnderson, Reico Cranshaw and Roosevelt Hawkins, of conspiring to commit acts of terrorism in the United States on behalf of Libya.

Buford, an ex-convict, said he first introduced Hulon to Knox at the Southern Girl Lounge, 119 E. Pershing Rd., where he regularly made drug sales. He said Knox had told Hulon he wanted to buy bulletproof vests, grenade launchers and infra-red field glasses.

Hulon finally sold the missile to Knox and Melvin Mayes, another accused gang member who reportedly has fled to Libya, at the Holiday Inn in suburban Lansing in July, 1986.

Buford referred to the close control wielded by Fort, ``the chief,`` in all gang dealings from drugs to the purchase of the rocket.

At one point, he said, he was sitting in the Southern Girl Lounge when Knox and two other El Rukns came in and said ``the chief`` wanted him on the phone at the El Rukn headquarters, 3949 S. Drexel Ave., regarding a drug transaction.

Fort allegedly directed the Libyan conspiracy from his cell in a Texas prison, where he was serving a 13-year narcotics sentence. The prosecution`s case rests on 3,500 hours of tape-recorded telephone conversations made from the prison by Fort, in which the plots were allegedly discussed, using an elaborate code.

Buford said he did not speak directly to Fort but through other gang members and could not understand the conversation taking place over the phone. Some of the words were in English and ``some weren`t,`` he said.

Prosecutors will have to prove that the code words used in the recorded conversations were referring to terrorist plots. For this they are expected to depend heavily on the testimony of a seventh accused gang member, Trammel Davis, who pleaded guilty on the eve of the trial. His family also received an unspecified amount of money, Podliska said.

Buford said all people entering the El Rukn headquarters, known as ``the Fort,`` were searched by guards and had to prove their identity.